Unsimulated sex in non-pornographic films?

Yeah, I agree with this.

I'm all for it only if the directors aren't complete degenerate creeps and the actors feel safe, which sadly is rare.

I think the simulated sex scenes in Blue is the Warmest Colour are a lot more exploitative (not to mention choreographed with dubious consent) than the use of unsimulated sex in say Nymphomaniac, just for one example.

I also think there's inherent value in provocation and taboo-skewering for its own sake in the right contexts, but there's also a line between pure shock value (Gaspar Noe IMO) and valuable shock... something like In the Realm of the Senses where the sex scenes heighten the stakes and make the film feel rawer, more intimate, more uncomfortable, and ultimately a more powerful experience.

There is a subreddit (r/extramile) with mostly female related content that might help. It's NSFW.

so a couple things.

1. I think it's deeply unfortunate that the film damaged Matsuda's career because her performance is revelatory. I don't know what she thought about it later, but her involvement despite the high stakes illustrates her fearlessness and makes you appreciate the performance even more.

2. Since we're dealing in hypotheticals, actresses living in misogynistic & prissy cultures receive pushback and are shamed for filming simulated sex scenes too, in fact all the time. We don't know that Matsuda wouldn't have ended up being "exiled" even if the film hadn't contained unsimulated scenes. I think any film about Sada Abe would've been controversial in Japan in 1977, but Oshima's refusal to censor himself is a reason the film is still seen and talked about today.

unsimulated acts sexual or otherwise in any film are inherently more raw because they're real and not just choreographed or shot around or manipulated. Cinema at its best is a mirror held up to the human experience. Some things you obviously shouldn't show (killing animals, endangering cast and crew -- looking at you Ruggero Deodato ), but sex provided it's consensual and safe isn't something I ever see as having to be defended in the first place, so that's part of where our disconnect is coming from. You (and OP) seem to be asking "why" and I'm just asking "why not"? All societies have such high tolerances for war, oppression, misogyny, slavery, poverty, violence, child mortality and nativism that sex is the last thing that should be taboo yet it's often the first thing to roil sensibilities.

The Rylance example is very unfortunate but all it shows to me is the importance of consent, safety and respect in filming/choreographing any sex scenes, simulated or not, because performers can be *just* as exploited filming simulated scenes. Conversely, if simulated scenes can be filmed ethically, surely unsimulated scenes can as well.

You and mikediastavrone96 might appreciate Manohla Dargis' defense of Sevigny in her NY Times review of The Brown Bunny:

I'll admit I was taken aback by the violent unsimulated scenes in Lust, Caution. Left me in a daze for a day or two.

I think with the new spread of what are called "intimacy coordinators" (I believe it is something that is now becoming a standard in the post-Me Too movement world and I, for one, think it's a brilliant change) on sets in film and television, if the creative excuse is to seem more realistic, then I think that will increasingly be seen as a crock. Simulated sex scenes are becoming more realistic moving forward because they are completely mapped out in every sense by these coordinators (even down to the breathing lol) and it helps that they make things safer, less awkward, and more comfortable for the actors to perform these scenes. There are so many actors with horror stories who wish they had this. Now I dislike the idea of shame and careers being ruined over unsimulated - and it falls on actresses more than the directors, wouldn't you say? This is just my feeling on the necessity of it moving forward if a filmmaker is gunning for authenticity.

I do think finniussnrub makes a point that with some films, the hype of "And they were really doing it!" is played into for the media.

wasn't Miloš Forman basically exiled from Czechoslovakia for poking fun at Eastern European communism in Firemen's Ball? We celebrate artists taking risks all the time even and perhaps especially when they provoke (Battle of Algiers is another good example, Salo, etc). And yeah I do have an even greater appreciation of Matsuda's performance knowing what she was risking. As far as risk to the actors themselves, obviously it's potentially precarious especially for women. I don't disagree with you on that at all and there are a hundred ways if could be done in an exploitative way, but provided the actors give their consent and support the vision and the scenes are created safely, public outcry could not matter less to me. 

re: Caligula, I didn't say "raw" was always good lol. I understand raw just to mean frank. Where the tacked-on sex scenes in Caligula distract, the scenes in Realm of the Senses enhance the realism and draw you further into the story, for me anyways, but they both contain raw depictions of sex. At least in the sense that real sex is being performed and shown, but obviously in Caligula that comes with an extra helping of cheesy porno music.